Actually the drafters of the UK bill could not come up with a formulation for consummation of a same sex marriage

Middle Eastern countries used to rely on a bloodstained bedsheet hanging out the window. Maybe consumation of gay marriage would involve minimal change to this tradition, just a change of colour to brown.

Nope, they are legally identical, and recognised as such. And so too will be gay marriage, with a minor gain to society as a whole.

If they were legally identical there would be no clamour for change, I would be unable to show precisely how they were different, and how pretending they are the same makes the institution itself incoherent.

Dover, in a democracy, a majority view on a law change is in fact a good argument for the change.

So, once a majority view forms, even if it is in principle, arbitrary, incoherent, and/or evil, it is a good argument for change merely to say that it is the majority view. Wow.

Contemplating some alternative that has no public support is not an argument against the change, it’s as dumb as the beagle argument.

Not at all. If you present an argument in which I can simply substitute a term and thus illustrate its weakness, that is a dumb argument, not the illustration. So far as the beagle argument is concerned, neither is that a dumb argument since it demonstrates that given the acceptance of that redefinition, there can be no in principle objection to the latter change, and were a majority to support such a change, given what you write above, you would find that a good argument for beagle-human ‘marriage’.

If they were legally identical there would be no clamour for change, I would be unable to show precisely how they were different

There is no legal clamour for change – married empty-nester couples have the same rights, responsibilities and recognition as breeders. There is also no clamour to not recognise them – and once gay couples win the right to marry, nor will there be any clamour to derecognise them.

It is certainly a core institution, the benefits of which will soon be enjoyed by gay people as well.

The benefits are matched by hardships in real life real marriages. Including the financial hardships experienced by most suburban couples as they struggle to bring up their kids and make ends meet. Including bearing with the problems often experienced after childbirth with the mother too tired and uninterested in sex. Including the expectation that through it all sexual fidelity will be maintained. Somehow I can’t see any of that happening to our newly minted newly weds as they waltz off to the opera and the next cocktail party.

I would argue that the rule of law is the core institution of civilisation. In fact, if you look up civilisation in the dictionary, I’m pretty sure it will say something to that effect.

The rule of law doesn’t perpetuate the human race. The rule of law does not provide the framework for our emotional support and physical survival. The rule of law does not look after us when we are sick and provide a circle of warmth and protection not only for family members but often for waifs and strays and orphans. Marriage is the beginning of the thousands of family groups which provide most of us with refuge in a hostile world. The union of man and wife in fact forms the basis of our very existence.

Including the expectation that through it all sexual fidelity will be maintained. Somehow I can’t see any of that happening to our newly minted newly weds as they waltz off to the opera and the next cocktail party.

Why would male homosexuals be any less likely to be monogamous than male heterosexuals?

Which great thinkers in history have advocated polygamy for “thousand of years”?

Mohammad certainly qualifies as a great thinker, or at least an influential one. He was certainly a greater thinker than you are, and, for all his faults, he would not have invoked Joseph Stalin to argue against gay marriage.

The rule of law doesn’t perpetuate the human race. The rule of law does not provide the framework for our emotional support and physical survival. The rule of law does not look after us when we are sick and provide a circle of warmth and protection not only for family members but often for waifs and strays and orphans.

Elephants manage to do all of that without the hassle of getting married.

Read, The Age of Empathy by Frans De Waal then get back to me on that. Animals have morality, human crowd behavior as some surprising similarities with animal herd behavior. Frans de Waal even cites a case of a rescued whale thanking its saviors and a chimp that tries to help a bird fly away. As Darwin noted: He who understand the baboon will do more to advance philosophy than Locke. (M Book) Hell I just read an article on how even basic chemistry exhibits “intentionality”, “competition”. Natural selection is not just about Life. As some physicists have argued the process is a pervasive feature of the universe. I await the next installment from the Alternberg 16.

The union of man and wife in fact forms the basis of our very existence.

This is why society has historically privileged this form of relationship. The attempt to superimpose a preferred ideology over brute fact has mostly characterised the antics of the Left – until now. Sections of the right, traditionally the more grounded in commonsense, have evidently been bamboozled by the weasel word “equality” and the laudable desire to be nice to gay people. This is a sign that the culture war has largely been lost.

The Age of Empathy by Frans De Waal then get back to me on that. Animals have morality, human crowd behavior as some surprising similarities with animal herd behavior.

The inability/unwillingness to distinguish between the animal and human levels of existence is one consequence of our living in a secular age. Cooking up the notion of gay “marriage” is another outcome of the prevailing culture. Peter Hitching (quoted and linked in the Open thread) explains that it is futile to argue with those in the grip of the current paradigm. He is probably right.

Sections of the right, traditionally the more grounded in commonsense, have evidently been bamboozled by the weasel word “equality” and the laudable desire to be nice to gay people.

I can only speak for myself – gay marriage is a worthy cause not because it will lead to equality, but because it will encourage gays to lead more traditional lifestyles. I advocate gay marriage on exactly the same grounds that I advocate heterosexual marriage.

I can only speak for myself – gay marriage is a worthy cause not because it will lead to equality, but because it will encourage gays to lead more traditional lifestyles. I advocate gay marriage on exactly the same grounds that I advocate heterosexual marriage.

I think you will find that gay activists’ drive for gay marriage is more about enforcing equality than enthusiasm for the act of getting married. The gay subculture is antithetic to the values of monogamy – it encompasses the cult of youth, the body beautiful and unfettered sexual expression. How you mean to shoehorn all of that into a bourgeois lifestyle is a mystery.

From my experience, you will find that gays who inhabit the mainstream of society, avoid the gay ghetto/subculture like the plague and oftentimes vote right of centre are already in long-term relationships and need no persuading on this issue. They are not at all obviously gay and are more interested in equal rights rather than being able to marry.

I think you will find that gay activists’ drive for gay marriage is more about enforcing equality than enthusiasm for the act of getting married. The gay subculture is antithetic to the values of monogamy – it encompasses the cult of youth, the body beautiful and unfettered sexual expression. How you mean to shoehorn all of that into a bourgeois lifestyle is a mystery.

From my experience, you will find that gays who inhabit the mainstream of society, avoid the gay ghetto/subculture like the plague and oftentimes vote right of centre are already in long-term relationships and need no persuading on this issue. They are not at all obviously gay and are more interested in equal rights rather than being able to marry.

The inability/unwillingness to distinguish between the animal and human levels of existence is one consequence of our living in a secular age. Cooking up the notion of gay “marriage” is another outcome of the prevailing culture. Peter Hitching (quoted and linked in the Open thread) explains that it is futile to argue with those in the grip of the current paradigm. He is probably right.

Yea right.

Often the time the idiot creatures just turn back and beach themselves again.

Confirmation bias, knew that would happen. Strike One. So intelligent you don’t even have to read the studies, so insightful into behavior that you already have the answers. The whole point of this research is to highlight both differences and similiarities. No-one is arguing our behaviours is just like animals. Straw Man. Strike Two. Human beings do plenty of stupid things too, like fail to recognise our propensity for innate cognitive deficits. Strike Three.

I can only speak for myself – gay marriage is a worthy cause not because it will lead to equality, but because it will encourage gays to lead more traditional lifestyles.
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The gays of that ilk won’t get married.
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And the gays of this ilk will get married.

Fisky, you’ve just defeated your argument. Firstly, you support gay ‘marriage’ to encourage more traditional lifestyles only to admit that gays of the first ilk will simply avoid it while gays of the second ilk would be monogamous anyway.

More importantly though, what business does the government have encouraging exclusivity and permanence in a relationship that is in and of itself non-procreative? Perfectly reasonable encouraging marriage between the sexes since children may result from coitus but not in SSR. If the latter want to have multiple partners, that is their own business. Thus, by adding such a relationship within the ambit of marriage you undermine the coherence of exclusivity and permanence therein and essentially radicalize (read dissolve) a once traditional institution.

In respect of the social beneficial outcomes argument you raise, friendship, as well, has lots of socially beneficially outcomes, but it is no business of the government to encourage these (although it shouldn’t put any impediments in its place) or create legal instruments that do so, or to pretend that friendship is marriage in order to obtain some socially beneficial outcome.

Hell I just read an article on how even basic chemistry exhibits “intentionality”,…

Aristotle’s and Aquinas’s revenge! JohnH, I really think the next 50 years are going to explode the modern paradigm in philosophy and science that more or less junked formal and final causes without even an argument.

Who said that all the current generation of screaming queens would suddenly settle down and get on the, er, straight and narrow? We have nothing to offer those people and can basically forget about them. What we do have to offer young gay people who have yet to go off the rails into Peter Patton territory is the possibility of being a normal member of society with the same opportunities as straights and none of the guilt and fear that caused the radical reaction and alienation in the first place. And giving them the same recognition and responsibilies as any other long term couple will delegitimise the malcontents and bourgeoisify homosexuality totally. Even if the gambit doesn’t come off, the effects will be miniscule compared to single parenting.

I really think the next 50 years are going to explode the modern paradigm in philosophy and science that more or less junked formal and final causes without even an argument.

That started about 90 years ago. Remember all those quotes I provided some months ago?The idea of chemical processes being subject to natural selection like processes is pretty much old hat by now and can be approached from chemistry, physics, and mathematics. It may mean more than that which is why I remain in the “I don’t bloody well know” camp. I prefer Occam’s razor here, if a more basic explanation elucidates the process I’ll stay with that rather than thinking it implies more than that.

It could pan out as you say, that wouldn’t surprise me but I won’t live long enough to see those questions answered. I’m not sure anyone will. There are limits to what we can know.

A stunning example of re-assembly is the tobacco mosaic virus. Chop it up into nucleotides, place it in a broth, and it will re-assemble into an active virus.

BTW, I’ve just finished reading the most distressing book on the history psycho-pharmacology(David Healy). I’m tempted to join the anti-psychiatrist brigade but they are nuts.

Have a good weekend DB. I like your ideas even if don’t agree with them.

I find it distressing to acknowledge that the social engineers of the left have won a resounding victory in the culture war – such as people on our side of the debate can no longer discriminate because discrimination has now be made a pejorative term.

The breakdown of family values in the US (which is now only gradually being reversed) is real, but has nothing to do with gay marriage.

The gay marriage debate is a consequence of the ‘breakdown in family values’ and not a cause.

Gay marriage will make practically no difference to the number of fatherless households.

Oh, well that’s okay then. Rather than getting back to the root of the problem, which is reinvigorating and supporting what used to be considered the normal scheme of things, let’s just throw a few more things into the mix.

What could possibly go wrong? After all, some places already have gay marriage and it’s not all gone to hell in a handbasket.

Yet.

These things play out over decades – look at where we’ve landed 40 years after the ‘sexual revolution’. How’s that working for us?

I don’t know why you are invoking the sexual revolution in the context of gay marriage. Gays have been with us forever, and always will be. The question is, what role would you like them to play in society? I want them to be like any other minority group – fully assimilated and responsible members of society. I think the former, religious approach of shaming them out of existence or worse was evil and destructive.

The basis for SSM is the idea that sexual attraction and the sentiment of love are what marriage is only about. Given these two premises, if M is sexually attracted to M – and they cannot help to be otherwise – and they both sincerely and consensually feel love for each other, they should be allowed to marry. But given that these two premises cannot exclude polyamorous and/or incestuous marriages, then I’m not sure why anyone should be persuaded by the cogency of these premises and/or their conclusion.

I think any and all couples should be permitted contracts which align inheritance, power of attorney, mutual agency, and so on to their own wishes. I’m not sure why this is being talked about purely in terms of gay people. Why shouldn’t non- or a-sexual couples get rights?

Then we can neatly split off state recognised contracts from religious obligations, or introduce a contract specifically for those who reasonably expect to form a breeding pair. Once that’s done, due to religious tolerance, the state can formally acknowledge religious cremonies that also fit the already acknowledged parameters of exclusivity and mutual consent.

I suggest we call this new institution “marriage”.

But no. No, that’s not equal. We need to reduce everything to totally identical and essentially formless, therefore meaningless, non-definitions, so that it will be fair.

But given that these two premises cannot exclude polyamorous and/or incestuous marriages, then I’m not sure why anyone should be persuaded by the cogency of these premises and/or their conclusion.

That is why I reject the the gay lobby’s main argument about allowing same sex marriage that it is about ‘equal love’, equality and it is irrelevant of gender. The same argument could be used for polyamourous marraiges. It is about love, irrelevant of the number of people. Instead of gender, it will turn into a number debate. I don’t think gay marriage is a big deal either way, but I do think it has the potential to lead to such concepts being considered.

I think any and all couples should be permitted contracts which align inheritance, power of attorney, mutual agency, and so on to their own wishes. I’m not sure why this is being talked about purely in terms of gay people. Why shouldn’t non- or a-sexual couples get rights?

Non and a-sexual couples do have those rights. You don’t need to consummate your marriage to get the legal benefits. You only need to sign the paper.

The reason this being talked about in terms of gay people is that gay couples do not have these rights.

But no. No, that’s not equal. We need to reduce everything to totally identical and essentially formless, therefore meaningless, non-definitions, so that it will be fair.

Of course this is the kind of thinking that is driving the left project in all areas – fair is the ultimate weasel word. Maybe next we will see artifical wombs embedded in men who want to experience carrying a baby which will then be delivered via a caesarian – why not? It’s only fair.

As a sceptical John Cleese observes in Life of Brian of a male colleague who insists on his right to have a baby: “It’s not symbolic of our struggle against oppression. It’s symbolic of our struggle against reality!” Same goes for the struggle for gay “marriage” methinks.

And as a consequence theirs will always be a “marriage” in inverted commas. Like I said earlier – apparently every child must now get a prize. Truly pathetic that they grasp at this crumb which they (and their supporters) confuse with the ingredients of bread.

Of course not. The assumption was always there that they could make a family together. That is why non consummation is grounds for annulment. They often suffer quite anough when this turns out not to be the case.

What is consummation of the “marriage” of two blokes? What constitutes adultery? It all gets pretty biological doesn’t it Dot. But lets just ignore inconvenient reality in our determination to ride roughshod over such considerations.

Of course this is the kind of thinking that is driving the left project in all areas – fair is the ultimate weasel word. Maybe next we will see artifical wombs embedded in men who want to experience carrying a baby which will then be delivered via a caesarian – why not? It’s only fair.

Lol… but perhaps I should not laugh too quickly.

Socialism is indeed all about reducing people to a common sameness, and that’s exactly with gay people should be shit scared of democratic socialists.

And before civil rights, white people used to joke that they could one day be working for a black boss.

That’s not a slippery-slope argument though; gay marriage was always asserted to be. Anyway I summarised my thoughts as well as I could upthread. Civilised societies have tolerated gays for a long time now. My question boils down to what marriage, versus any other contract, actually is.

My solution is a wider range of contracts available for ostensibly long-term, exclusive pairs. In short I’d abolish marriage as it stands and introduce a standard form with optional allowances for religious observance. Everyone gets access, and religious folks get to have their own institution.

But really this isn’t about liberty, it’s about social dominance and group identity. That’s just my view of politics in general.

Of course not. This has been explained many times. Procreativity is not a test applied to particular couples because particular instances of a type may fail. The test is applied to the general type, MF or MM/FF relationships and when we do we find that the latter is non-procreative; it cannot fail to procreative, it just isn’t procreative. Period. Therefore, it isn’t a general relationship orientated towards children and thus it is not marriage. It really is that simple.

BTW, it’s heartening to see that those supporting gay ‘marriage’ are also quietly supportive of ‘marriage equality’ for polyamorous and incestuous arrangements.

Is it just me? Or is there a fundamental flaw in John H argument that allowing gay marriage will breed out the gay gene or population. The only problem is that you go on to tell us how a friend of your Mum had their marriage annulled because the gay husband (presumably) never had sex with his wife. Mmmmm. You do know how kids are made don’t you?

1. It is just you. I refer you to various genetic analyses which show that even the faintest of changes in selection pressure can have wide ranging changes in gene frequency over the generations. Eg. E. Vbra: a 2% selection advantage will enable the relevant genes over 40 generations to sweep through a gene pool( if the individual organisms are close enough together of course).

Furthermore I cited 3 possibilities for the ongoing presence of homosexuality. All much more sensible than Evol. Psych. argument.s

2. Without consummation a marriage can be annulled, it is not even marriage. We have numerous examples of men who married, seeded children, but were gay. Maybe they did it while thinking of their favourite body-builder. There remains the possibility that genes are influential, it is entirely plausible to think that could be true even though the xq28 chromosomal finding is extremely weak but its association with the androgen receptor is intriguing. I would prefer a location that is associated with aromatase though because some studies do point to changes in estrogen\testosterone levels sexual orientation.

And before civil rights, white people used to joke that they could one day be working for a black boss.

A totally false analogy. This expression of bigotry – the very real possibility of having a black boss one day – cannot be compared to the impossibility of two blokes getting married. Such are the times we live in the impossible is countenanced in the name of ideology.

PS Attempts to compare blacks’ struggle for civil rights with gay politics have been soundly rebuffed by African Americans and rightly so.

HAS there ever been a weirder political issue than gay marriage? A cool-headed look back at events in Britain last week, where David Cameron’s gay marriage bill was passed in the House of Commons, suggests, no, there hasn’t been.

And yet all of this political freakiness, this bonkers expansion of marriage by those who don’t much care for it to those have never needed it, is treated as perfectly normal by observers.

More than that, it is depicted as a glorious moment in human history, on a par with blacks in America winning civil rights or women getting the vote. Has the world gone mad? I hope so, because otherwise I definitely have.

For all the harebrained attempts to doll up the passing of the marriage bill as the endpoint to 50 years of gay agitation, the truth is early gay radicals campaigned against marriage, not for it.

Marriage is a “rotten, oppressive institution”, said the 1970 Gay Manifesto. Homosexuals are “in revolt against the nuclear family structure”, said the influential Gay is Good tract of 1972.

The cranky claim that a Tory PM giving gays the right to get hitched represents the realisation of the dreams of those Stonewall rioters of 1969 (who actually wanted to abolish “all existing social institutions”) should be causing far more eyebrows to rise.
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Gay marriage is an entirely invented issue, magicked up by a morally bereft political class desperate to appear meaningful, purposeful. So now they congratulate themselves for having made history while ordinary Brits look on in bamboozlement, decidedly unconvinced that history has happened or that our aloof, principle-lite rulers are the new Rosa Parks.

I’m bored with gay marriage. Can we talk about no-fault divorce instead?

I’ve never paid attention to the issue, so I’m interested in what people think. Because some upthread were critical, here’s a positive side:

Easy access to divorce redistributes marital power from the party interested in preserving the marriage to the partner who wants out. In most instances, this resulted in an increase in marital power for women, and a decrease in power for men.

Our analysis of US data revealed the legislative change [to no-fault divorce] had caused female suicide to decline by about a fifth, domestic violence to decline by about a third, and intimate femicide – the husband’s murder of his wife – to decline by about a tenth.

Personally I think no-fault divorce kind of cuts both ways. Since fault is basically determined by the State I would have to decide to what extent the State is entitled to interfere; although there is a broken contract involved…

Yeah, no idea. I’ve seen bad cases both ways: good people abandoned by spouses, bad spouses escaped by people who deserved better. I think people don’t pay enough attention to the contract they’re signing. Perhaps a more realistic contract with explicit escape clauses, and normal enforcement of contract law thereafter?

Another complication is the noise pollution from family law in general, which can only be described as “all over the place like a madman’s shit”. It’s a diabolical system that manages to be misanthropic, misogynist, misandrist, and profoundly dehumanising all at once. The drop in suicides might be purely from reduced exposure to it, in which case I would say no-fault divorce is very very good as a legal construct. Lesser of two evils by a long shot.

Libertarian argument: People should be free to engage in their own customs, relationships and commitments. The state demanding to know why you dare end a marriage seems little better, in that sense, from the state arranging your marriages in the first place.

Conservative argument: the state is required to work towards sustaining and normalising institutions that preserve the benefits of a civilised and effective society. It is taken as fact that stable, long term marriages are highly desirable economically and socially and therefore government must be concerned with stabilising and extending marriages.

I would suggest that seen in broad enough terms marriage is pair bonding and religion is group identity, so both probably survive on timelines more attuned to substantial adaptive change or evolution, rather than election cycles, social movements, or even civilisations.

The track record of, say, Judaism for outliving the polities it inhabits is impressive. However pair bonding is (so I am told) older than modern humans, necessary to providing the surplus resources for raising such helpless pups with such enormous brains.

“I would suggest that seen in broad enough terms marriage is pair bonding”

It’s a formalisation of pair bonding. There’s no reason to prevent people who have pair-bonded from formalising that relationship, even if they are of a tiny minority that can only pair-bond with their own sex.

I don’t argue for no formalisation, I argue for a rationalisation of formalisation and a broadening of the availability of the legal “package” beyond bonded pairs; while retaining a formal recognition of the pre-existing traditins.

It’s a formalisation of pair bonding. There’s no reason to prevent people who have pair-bonded from formalising that relationship, even if they are of a tiny minority that can only pair-bond with their own sex.

Except that the extension of the notion of ‘pair-bonding’ to SSRs between human beings or other animals is ridiculous since the term refers to a particular type of mating system orientated toward the generation of offspring. Since SSRs are non-generative they cannot be considered ‘pair-bonds’ without undermining the usefulness of the term.

“Since SSRs are non-generative they cannot be considered ‘pair-bonds’ without undermining the usefulness of the term.”

Biologically, humans are driven to pair up to produce offspring, that’s true. But the fact is that some people have what amounts to a coding error that renders them homosexual, but still have the pair-bonding drive. Since we already have marriage between non-generative heterosexual people, there’s no reason to deny it to non-generative homosexual people. Both groups can be the exceptions to the (fading) rule without any negative effects, so why not?

No fault divorce, followed by ‘harm minimisation’ of various other experiments. ‘Family’ Court has not made divorce any better. Anger has been unleashed and many hurt. Each experiment has had unforeseen yet negative consequences. Now smarriage? The negative consequences will surely follow.

Well actually it doesn’t. There’s nothing to prevent a gay or other unconventional (transgendered for example) couple holding a ceremony to formalise their arrangement. My question is can they then assign rights such as inheritance and next-of-kin to their liking or are they essentially banned from doing so?

Biologically, humans are driven to pair up to produce offspring, that’s true. But the fact is that some people have what amounts to a coding error that renders them homosexual, but still have the pair-bonding drive.

Wow. I never imagined that Jarrah would say that homosexuals are objectively disordered.

Since we already have marriage between non-generative heterosexual people, there’s no reason to deny it to non-generative homosexual people. Both groups can be the exceptions to the (fading) rule without any negative effects, so why not?

Because procreativity is not a hurdle for particular cases of MF but for the general case, MM or FF. Particular cases of MF may fail to procreate, but MM and FF cannot even fail. Procreation isn’t a condition but an orientation of the relationship; the conditions of marriage are (i) a relationship between the sexes, that is (ii) permanent, and (iii) exclusive. I’m not sure why you fail to recognize the significance of this. BTW, all that is being denied to SSR is recognition as marriage because it lacks this orientation and fails in respect of at least one of its conditions.

That’s very rough and maybe a little haywire but it shows why they want formalisation to be legally recognised.

So give ‘em a contract that does all that in a neat package. But don’t re-write the Marriage Act ad-hoc. Use a specific instrument so that it can be tuned and tweaked as needed without carrying on the ridiculous fiction that all relationships are the same thing.

“Wow. I never imagined that Jarrah would say that homosexuals are objectively disordered.”

That’s not what I said. I’m about as likely to call albinos ‘disordered’, or people with six fingers.

Your comment says a lot about your worldview where categories are static and discrete, in which there is no room for uncomfortable facts like how every single person in existence has hundreds of genetic mutations.

“Procreation isn’t a condition but an orientation of the relationship”

Not any more. The institution’s purpose has changed. Have you done that straw poll of your family, friends and acquaintances that I suggested long ago? Where you ask them why they got married, or what marriage means to them? You may be surprised at the results.

“the conditions of marriage are (i) a relationship between the sexes, that is (ii) permanent, and (iii) exclusive.”

No, that’s just your opinion. Which is fine, I wouldn’t impinge on your right to your opinion. What I do object to is your insistence that the government legally enforce your opinion about marriage. And don’t give me that crap about how the state has a vital interest in the status quo. A, that argument conflates society and the state, and B, marriage pre-dates the state so obviously doesn’t need its oversight. While not a logical flaw, that argument also has the scary possibility of plausibly justifying a great deal of social engineering or other government interference with individual choices.

“Even more so is the poll on gay marriage that GetUp is circulating around Facebook at the moment. I won’t debate it here, but it smacks of what Obama did in the US – hold out the promise for gays that they’ll get what they want if they vote Labor/Greens. FUCK THAT FUCKING SHIT. They’ve had five years to do it, certainly the better part of three, and have done FUCK-ALL, which is EXACTLY what they will do if re-elected.”

Perturbed, you seem confused. Labor has had time to do something substantial, but they officially opposed SSM until the end of 2011, and a substantial minority of the party still do so, including the PM. Stephen Jones’ doomed bill is the only thing they’ve done, close enough to nothing for me to agree with you on that point. In the incredibly tiny probability that they are returned to government, they no doubt will do nothing again.

The Greens, which you bizarrely lump in with Labor as if there were no difference, have done a lot (certainly more than FUCK-ALL) to try to get SSM through Parliament, and will continue to push for the majority of Australians’ wishes on this issue to be heeded.

I’d be happy enough with the exact same thing by a different name, honestly… Since the word “marriage” apparently means so much to some people (???). Nobody owns or defines the word, and I’d argue that until I went blue in the face, but for now, the exact same contract with a different name would suffice. Nobody could prevent you from sending out wedding invitations with the word “marriage” on it, so it’s a trivial sticking point…

It still seems to me that the most rational approach to the situation is to remove any reference to the word “marriage” from any legislation and leave it up to individuals to use the word as they see fit. Would having a “Contract of Union” rather than a “Marriage Certificate” honestly make that much difference, to heterosexuals or homosexuals? Both parties are still going to call it marriage colloquially, you can’t stop that without infringing their right to free speech.

That’s not what I said. I’m about as likely to call albinos ‘disordered’, or people with six fingers.

May be I read too much into “But the fact is that some people have what amounts to a coding error that renders them homosexual, but still have the pair-bonding drive” as meaning anything. That seemed to indicate a disorder of some sort given what you said was an inclination to pair-bond and thus procreate with the singular attraction to persons of the same sex which is non-procreative.

Your comment says a lot about your worldview where categories are static and discrete, in which there is no room for uncomfortable facts like how every single person in existence has hundreds of genetic mutations.

You mean like the category ‘category’, ‘universals’, ‘institution’, and so on? Also, I haven’t offered any biological basis for this supposed orientation. And the fact that people have multiple genetic mutations is neither here nor there, since some give rise to disorders of one sort or other and others do not; some may even be advantageous in the circumstances, but very rarely.

It would however be interesting to know what ‘coding errors’ can be categorized as disorders and which cannot be, at least so far you’re concerned.

No, that’s just your opinion. Which is fine, I wouldn’t impinge on your right to your opinion. What I do object to is your insistence that the government legally enforce your opinion about marriage. And don’t give me that crap about how the state has a vital interest in the status quo. A, that argument conflates society and the state, and B, marriage pre-dates the state so obviously doesn’t need its oversight. While not a logical flaw, that argument also has the scary possibility of plausibly justifying a great deal of social engineering or other government interference with individual choices.

Oh, now we have the: Oh, it’s just your opinion argument; nope, it is simply a fact that marriage through the ages and in every culture has been a relationship between the sexes, exclusive, and permanent. Firstly, I’ve never argued the state has a vital interest in the status quo, it does have one so far as children are concerned. Secondly, I’m not sure why the state recognizing marriage conflates state and society any more than the state recognizing persons does. Thirdly, given that marriage is a pre-political institution it has very good reasons NOT to redefine marriage but to accept it in the form it encountered it and to improve the coherence of that relationship over time. SSM cannot be said to do this at all; erase the first condition – and thus the orientation towards children – and you render the second and third conditions incoherent. Fourthly, the only people engaging in social engineering are those arguing for a change in one of the conditions of this relationship that dissolves its basic orientation and renders the other two conditions incoherent. The effect of which is the gutting of the idea of marriage itself which appears to be the object of this whole charade anyway.

Fourthly, the only people engaging in social engineering are those arguing for a change in one of the conditions of this relationship that dissolves its basic orientation and renders the other two conditions incoherent.

That’s actually a good segue into the core of the matter. All public policy should undergo a CBA. The benefits of allowing SSM are small, but non-zero. The costs are zero. Therefore we should do it.

“nope, it is simply a fact that marriage through the ages and in every culture has been a relationship between the sexes, exclusive, and permanent.”

No, that’s wrong. Between the sexes, yes, but exclusivity and permanence have not always been features of marriage. Are you afraid that acknowledging this would undermine your argument? Because you’re right. No wonder you keep your hands clapped over your ears and endlessly babble “betweenthesexesexclusivityandpermanence”.

You also keep ignoring one of my main points – it doesn’t matter what marriage has been, it only matters what it is now. Done that survey yet?

“Firstly, I’ve never argued the state has a vital interest in the status quo, it does have one so far as children are concerned. Secondly, I’m not sure why the state recognizing marriage conflates state and society any more than the state recognizing persons does.”

Your first point is the conflation of state and society. Your second is a strawman.

“Thirdly, given that marriage is a pre-political institution it has very good reasons NOT to redefine marriage but to accept it in the form it encountered it and to improve the coherence of that relationship over time.”

Which is a very nice way of saying you want the state to freeze society and its institutions (ie, the standard conservative position), and actively work against its own citizens’ wishes about how they want to live their personal lives.

“Fourthly, the only people engaging in social engineering are those arguing for a change in one of the conditions of this relationship that dissolves its basic orientation and renders the other two conditions incoherent”

What an utter perversion of the concept. Letting people do what they want is the OPPOSITE of social engineering.

Which is a very nice way of saying you want the state to freeze society and its institutions (ie, the standard conservative position), and actively work against its own citizens’ wishes about how they want to live their personal lives.

If there was never a reason for this, we could just go straight to anarchy and be done with it.

Without a powerful ideal of masculinity that points men toward marriage and fatherhood, more and more young men are deciding the hard work of becoming marriageable isn’t worth it: Porn, beer, video games with the guys, freedom and fleeting sexual encounters are good enough.

Porn, beer, video games with the guys, freedom and fleeting sexual encounters are good enough.

I don’t quite get the porn angle though. Porn is really boring. It’s like going to a strip joint with the endless teasing but you can’t touch. Better just pump and dump.

To be honest it was the womeneses who push males into a corner when if the marriage breaks up legalized financial rape occurs and men left virtually destitute. Any advice to a young man should always be pump and dump and to scorn marriage like a vampire to a silver cross. And be sure to keep a journal of all meet ups seeing womeneses these days had the law changed where a relationship longer than a year is considered cohabitation even if the two have separate accommodation.

I could care less what consenting adults do with consenting adults, but it is difficult to see how. Anyway, I’m not convinced we’ve got the right to deny children the best environment possible, which I strongly believe is a mother and a father.

So if marriage doesn’t entail automatic adoption rights, I couldn’t care less if it becomes open to all. If it involves the acquisition of rights to children, not so much.

“I simply pointed out that advocates of homosexual ‘marriage’ are yet to explain why a man shouldn’t be legally entitled to marry a beagle.”

That’s because conservatives look at the diminishing hurdles for certain relationships to be called ‘marriage’ as a defacto elimination of all hurdles, including understanding and consent of all parties to the relationship. That’s a logical fallacy, but let’s run with it.

Say the government, rather than deregulating marriage, decides to expand what they recognise as marriage. So CL can finally marry his beagle, or even his lamp. The government is willing to recognise this as a marriage… are you? I’m not. I bet no-one else in this thread will do so either.

In fact, no-one other than fellow lamp-loving crazies are even going to consider this one-sided ‘marriage’ as such.

Does this hurt you, or me, or anyone else? Well, if there is some marriage-specific benefit the government wants to give, maybe taxpayers suffer. Since the legal benefits tend to assume a person is the beneficiary, that’s highly unlikely, but assuming there is some tax dodge (or whatever) open to lamp-marriers, then there would be a cost to society.

Otherwise (ie, in reality), someone declaring that they and their lamp is married is going to have as much impact as a small child talking about their imaginary friend needing a place at the table.

If opponents of SSM don’t want to recognise the relationship as marriage, that’s their right. They don’t have the right to impose their opinion through the apparatus of the state.

That’s because conservatives look at the diminishing hurdles for certain relationships to be called ‘marriage’ as a defacto elimination of all hurdles, including understanding and consent of all parties to the relationship. That’s a logical fallacy, but let’s run with it.

No we haven’t. We argued that if you deny that marriage is a relationship between the sexes of a certain sort, then its other aspects – that it is also exclusive and permanent – lose their coherence. Consent and understanding is not even a condition which distinguishes marriage from friendship, and not all relationships require consent or understanding. I don’t see any “diminishing hurdles” here.

Otherwise (ie, in reality), someone declaring that they and their lamp is married is going to have as much impact as a small child talking about their imaginary friend needing a place at the table.

That is what one would have said about same-sex ‘marriage’ only 50 years.

They don’t have the right to impose their opinion through the apparatus of the state.

No, no. It’s not my opinion; I’m just preserving the identity of marriage as we have known it for thousands of years. It’s you that wants to impose a new definition – that is not identity-preserving – by means of the apparatus of the state. Thankfully, you’ve as yet been unsuccessful.

Apparently you think ownership of a pet is equivalent to a contract with that pet. Now who’s silly?

Now why would I think that? I was addressing directly why you thought marriage must be a contract. Why, again, must it be that? Is there something in the nature of marriage that requires it to be only ever a relationship between human beings, and yet not a relationship between the sexes? At the moment your answer is rather circular: why not human-nonhuman marriage? Because marriage is contractual and thereby consensual. Why? Because it is a relationship between human beings. Why? Because it is a contract.

“During a discussion Saturday afternoon with “sexologist” Jill McDevitt, who conducts workshops on sexual topics at college campuses across the country, roughly 40 students had to reconsider their idea of “normal” in sex when asked to take anonymous surveys that yielded surprising results. Students often do not realize the difference between normative — being in the middle of the bell curve for certain behaviors — and normal, which is a judgment call, McDevitt said, adding that what is common is not necessarily good just as what is deviant is not necessarily bad.”

You illiterate fool, I’ve repeatedly and clearly stated my preference for their to be NO law specifically relating to marriage.

“I’m just preserving the identity of marriage as we have known it for thousands of years”

Repeating your empirically false assertion for the thousandth time doesn’t make it true. Besides, argument from tradition is a fallacy. That something is a tradition means we have to be careful about messing with it, not that it’s inviolable. Lastly, marriage has ALREADY CHANGED. I’m just proposing the law catches up to the society it purports to serve.

“Because marriage is contractual and thereby consensual. Why? Because it is a relationship between human beings.”

That’s not a step in my logic, nor anyone I’ve seen, so this supposed circularity is all in your head.

Marriage is contractual because people exchange binding promises. This also defeats your friendship and cohabitation lines of attack.

Repeating your empirically false assertion for the thousandth time doesn’t make it true. Besides, argument from tradition is a fallacy. That something is a tradition means we have to be careful about messing with it, not that it’s inviolable. Lastly, marriage has ALREADY CHANGED. I’m just proposing the law catches up to the society it purports to serve.

It’s empirically false to assert that marriage has been for thousands of years a relationship between the sexes? No, it isn’t empirically false. BTW, I’m not making an argument from tradition which should be obvious given the argument you’ve just criticized.

That’s not a step in my logic, nor anyone I’ve seen, so this supposed circularity is all in your head.

Marriage is contractual because people exchange binding promises.

LOL. In other words, marriage is contractual because it is consensual. Again, this argument is unavailable to you. Why must people “exchange binding promises” here? Because, that is what what they’ve always done in marriages? Effectively, the only way you can sustain this argument against human-nonhuman marriages is by reference to what you call an argument from tradition which is in part what I pointed out. Apparently, this element of marriage is inviolable but the element that involves it being a relationship between the sexes is not. Why this is the case remains mysterious.

LOL. You’re retroactively imposing a ‘coherence’ argument based on the traditional understanding of marriage. If anyone’s being circular, it’s you.

“In other words, marriage is contractual because it is consensual. ”

No, consensuality is part and parcel of making binding promises, but it’s not the sole component by a long shot.

“Effectively, the only way you can sustain this argument against human-nonhuman marriages is by reference to what you call an argument from tradition”

No, because I’m not RELYING on argument from tradition. I’m saying there’s a functionality in place that supplements the traditional aspect. That’s what your argument is lacking.

“Why this is the case remains mysterious.”

Not at all. You’re assuming all features of marriage have equal standing. I can point to relevant and functional aspects, you can only point to aspects that USED to be relevant and functional, but are NO LONGER.

Done that survey of friends and relatives yet? If not, why not? Afraid that people will say marriage has a meaning that diverges from your procreation-centric viewpoint?

No, I’m not asserting that this – or any -social institution doesn’t change. I’m asserting that those features that are essential to the identity of that social institutions do not change while the features that are not essential may change.

LOL. You’re retroactively imposing a ‘coherence’ argument based on the traditional understanding of marriage. If anyone’s being circular, it’s you.

Very strange. So now I’m not arguing from tradition but from coherence? But, anyway, that isn’t circular, Jarrah, since the purpose of ‘imposing’ coherence upon the practice of marriage, and our understanding of the practice, is to determine which traditional features are essential and which are not essential. That is what arguments from coherence do.

No, because I’m not RELYING on argument from tradition. I’m saying there’s a functionality in place that supplements the traditional aspect. That’s what your argument is lacking.

What ‘functionality’? You just argued that consensuality ‘supplements’ the fact that traditionally marriage involves making binding promises. Requirements aren’t functions or supplements. And as to this idea that functions are lacking in my argument, what do you think I mean when I say that marriage – aside from its unitive aspects – is orientated towards the generation, custody, care and education of children? Do you really think that I’m not intending to convey the idea that marriage performs several functions by contributing to these ends? Functions best and most efficaciously provided by marriage. And that these ends are, it is argued, reflected in the coherence of the conditions spelled out previously?

Not at all. You’re assuming all features of marriage have equal standing. I can point to relevant and functional aspects, you can only point to aspects that USED to be relevant and functional, but are NO LONGER.

You’re making two unrelated arguments here. I’ve never made the first. As to the second, I am pointing to relevant and functional (Oh, so now I am making arguments that involve functionality) features of marriage. Marriage remains, undisputedly, an exclusive and permanent relationship. Only those that support traditional marriage can provide an in-principle reason why such a relationship is exclusive and permanent, and that is because it is a relationship between the sexes,where all of these features are orientated towards love (unitivity) and family (procreativity). Proponents of SSM cannot because you and they believe it is a relationship between persons that simply involves the sentiment of love and sexual attraction and there is simply no in-principle reason why such a relationship need be exclusive or permanent, particularly where it involves a SSR.

Done that survey of friends and relatives yet? If not, why not?

Because I don’t conduct surveys in order to determine what are correct or incorrect beliefs. But if I did conduct a survey, I’d think that the results would show that they believe marriage is orientated towards love and family, even those that might erroneously support SSM.

Afraid that people will say marriage has a meaning that diverges from your procreation-centric viewpoint?

Not at all. I’ve always argued that marriage serves two principle ends (love and family), ends which are themselves related and give marriage its identity. It’s the proponents of SSM that want to rend one from the other and by doing so fundamentally change and dissolve the institution.

Gay marriage? It came up at dinner Down Under this time last year, and the prominent Aussie politician on my right said matter-of-factly, “It’s not about expanding marriage, it’s about destroying marriage.”

That would be the most obvious explanation as to why the same societal groups who assured us in the Seventies that marriage was either (a) a “meaningless piece of paper” or (b) institutionalized rape are now insisting it’s a universal human right. They’ve figured out what, say, terrorist-turned-educator Bill Ayers did — that, when it comes to destroying core civilizational institutions, trying to blow them up is less effective than hollowing them out from within.

The final word on homosexual marriage — If any given individual tells me that one guy sloshing his fully erect penis around in some other guy’s feces-filled colon is “normal”… obviously I’m not the one understanding what “normal” is.

An excreta-encrusted shlong should never be confused for a moral compass.

From a fb friend.

I’m just throwin’ it out there. This guy has a unique way of putting things, I think.

The purposes of the institution. Marriage exists because it serves personal and social functions. Many of these, in various places and various times, have had nothing to do with love or family (in the sense of having children). The functions marriage serves, and therefore the features it has, have changed over time.

Your entire argument is that the features that haven’t changed until recently are the core or essential features. This is a fallacy, and the key problem with argument-from-tradition.

I’m starting to get tired of this self-evidently false assertion you make. Ever heard of divorce? Permanence is therefore not one of your essential features. Exclusivity has a stronger claim, but not an absolute one. For reference, read the Bible. Plenty of non-exclusive marriage types (assuming you mean exclusive to two people).

“Proponents of SSM cannot [provide an in-principle reason why such a relationship is exclusive and permanent]”

More circularity. We don’t have to, because we don’t recognise those features as essential.

“Because I don’t conduct surveys in order to determine what are correct or incorrect beliefs.”

When it comes to social institutions, which are defined by how society practices them, there’s simply no other way to determine what is the correct ‘belief’ about them. They have no existence apart from the conduct of people. You can’t reason a correct belief about them from first principles.

“But if I did conduct a survey, I’d think that the results would show that they believe marriage is orientated towards love and family”

I agree. Nothing about love and family that requires two sexes, though, which you insultingly refuse to acknowledge.

When it comes to social institutions, which are defined by how society practices them, there’s simply no other way to determine what is the correct ‘belief’ about them. They have no existence apart from the conduct of people. You can’t reason a correct belief about them from first principles.

The law shapes society, society shapes the law. Are you saying that if a majority opposed SSM it would therefore be right for them to do so?

By the time we’re done with non-permanence, non-exclusivity, open to any two consulting adults, what we have is a business partnership. Why have a category for marriage if it has no characteristics?

The best argument against gay marriage I have ever seen is the claim that it is correlated with black family breakdown, neo-Stalinism, and the NHS. Nothing anyone puts up against gay marriage from now on can possibly beat that.

“Are you saying that if a majority opposed SSM it would therefore be right for them to do so?”

It’s not about right and wrong, by dover’s own terminology. But to be clear, social institutions are by definition majoritarian.

“Why have a category for marriage if it has no characteristics?”

I have never contended it has no special characteristics. Don’t repeat dover’s verballing of me.

Marriage is the closest possible relationship between unrelated people. It’s not friendship, it’s not cohabitation, it’s not a business partnership (although historically that has been a common rationale and core function of the practice – so much for love and family being unchanging characteristics!). How people define that closest possible relationship is up to them, not the law. Get the government out of marriage.

No, I’m not supporting anyone’s verballing. Sorry if it came across that way. I’m just trying to get my head around your definition.

As for business, it’s an unchanging characteristic of family, so I don’t quite get what you’re saying.

How people define that closest possible relationship is up to them, not the law.

So it doesn’t have any necessary characteristics? I thought a major argument for was equal consideration and protection under the law, an argument I find reasonable and compelling. If there are no legal characteristics of marriage then it’s not even a class of contract. Surely it is reasonable to expect that there will be necessary legal characteristics of, say, heterosexual breeding pairs, leaving aside words like “marriage”?

Are you simply arguing for marriage to be abolished as a legal construct?

They exist, but they are determined by majority persistent practice. That’s what a social institution means. They have been in flux since the year dot, and SSM is just the latest wrinkle.

“I thought a major argument for was equal consideration and protection under the law, an argument I find reasonable and compelling.”

That’s for SSM marriage advocates who want the legislative privileges to be doled out equally. That’s not me. I can understand them doing that, though – they’re acculturated to having government be a dominant figure in this as in so much else.

“Are you simply arguing for marriage to be abolished as a legal construct?”

I’m arguing that it shouldn’t be treated any differently by government than any other contract. The legal construction would be up to the parties, and given our biology, history and culture, marriage will have quite distinct characteristics that separate it from common-or-garden contracts.

The legal construction would be up to the parties, and given our biology, history and culture

You know that will never happen, right? I mean, it’s accepted that marriage MUST be dissoluble by one party, without consensus, or loss of rights by that party. Marriage as currently legally constituted is something of a farce as far as contracts go, and the family courts nothing BUT a farce; and I say that from the perspective of someone who does not think the family court is biased towards women.

As Brendan O’Neill points out, marriage is much more than that – it is an institution which links us to the past and extends those links into the future; it extends laterally in the present forming the network of blood links that form families binding people together and forming the basic building blocks of society.

That is why marriage is much more than simply a relationship between two people. It incorporates many people. It is not a dead end; it leads into the future. It is an institution which springs from the amazing creative power derived from the union between a man and a woman.

Marriage is related to religion, but we have a separation between church and state, and the public debate should be about the extent to which the state recognises marriage and grants benefits to married couples.

My first instinct is that the state should have nothing to do with marriage – that it should be left to the individuals who might choose to marry, and the private institutions through which they might choose to consecrate their union.

But marriage is not just about the choices of two (or more) adults! It represents the arrangement that is granted the blessing of society for the basis of the family, that is, for the solemn responsibility of raising the next generation. It is in this connection that the state has a legitimate interest in relationships between adults. We have a collective responsibility to ensure that children are raised in a salubrious, mainstream environment conducive to the social world of the species, which survives and thrives only because of its heterosexuality. And that means the complimentary yin and yang of a mother and a father. That normal couples sometimes fall short of the ideal is not a reason to abandon the ideal and thereby guarantee that it recedes still further.

That normal couples sometimes fall short of the ideal is not a reason to abandon the ideal and thereby guarantee that it recedes still further.

Well said. That there are few articulate public advocates for marriage is a symptom of our decadence. That void has bred a generation who mouth simplistic platitudes such as “love is love” and are unable to think or understand beyond this sentimental pablum.

We have failed utterly to pass on what is valuable to the next generation by actions and words. We see the result – especially amongst the so called “educated” class who should know better.

I am delighted to note that Barry O’Farrell is now for gay marriage, along with Campbell Newman and other far-sighted center-right leaders. I now predict that Tony Abbott will legislate for gay marriage in 2014/2015, although this may be a little hasty – it would be better left to his second term.

I am delighted to note that Barry O’Farrell is now for gay marriage, along with Campbell Newman and other far-sighted center-right leaders. I now predict that Tony Abbott will legislate for gay marriage in 2014/2015, although this may be a little hasty – it would be better left to his second term.

Apparently “commitment” is now O’Farrell’s criteria for entering into the state of marriage. Well there are a fair few people I am committed to one way or another but I hardly think that’s a reason to considerat any of them them as a potential marriage partner. The fact that I consider the notion of two blokes marrying each other as a ridiculous proposition has nothing to do with their being homosexual. It has everything to do with their being two blokes!

I now predict that Tony Abbott will legislate for gay marriage in 2014/2015, although this may be a little hasty – it would be better left to his second term.

Pyne was setting the ground for that today saying that although Coalition policy is against same sex marriage and so they would not be supporting it during this term of government, that there was no such policy set yet for the next term. So I can see it as entirely possible that Abbott will allow a concience vote – though I would guess it would be a private member’s bill rather than pushed by Abbott personally.

However both of them could have made the implications of normality more explicit. If marriage is an institution that encapsulates socially-approved human norms of romantic love, conjugal commitment, procreation, family, and the socialisation of the next generation; and if marriage ought to be for heterosexual couples, which I along with O’Neill and Caldwell believe it should – the this whole complex of things ought also properly to be the preserve of heterosexual couples. Gay love should not be seen as the equal of normal love. Gays should not be allowed to adopt or raise children. Laws that treat gay couples similarly to normal couples should be repealed. Governments should not give special dispensations to celebrations of gayness, for example Mardi Gras.

O’Neill is right that the demand for gay marriage has been engineered from above by a bunch of elite moral poseurs relying on shame and the sheen of judicial irreproachability rather than rational argument amidst the demos. As Caldwell says, “Either opinion is not changing as fast as it appears to be, or society is not as free.” In fact it’s a bit of both. Although the gay marriage cause is only a couple of decades old, its road was cleared by the steady evisceration of marriage by feminism beginning in the 1960s. No wonder people think gay marriage is no big deal; they don’t know what marriage is.

The gay marriage debate takes place in an alternate reality where marriage is a robust and well functioning institution. it’s not, for a host of reasons. And ‘branding’ isn’t one… the argument that gay marriage will somehow make marriage respectable again won’t wash; because the problems with the institution are real and to do with the legal mechanics.

There is a bigger issue than gay marriage, and that is the institution of marriage generally. Marriage itself is broken and in need of radical and urgent reform.

One problem is that in this age of fast paced change, experimentation with identity and hyperindividualism, young people see everything from jobs, to place of residence to relationships as inherently temporary. Everything is subject to change.

The concept of gay “marriage” fits neatly into this paradigm – much more so than marriage as we have always known it. Complementary sex roles and sexual identity have previously been enshrined in marriage. So have notions of permanence, faithfulness and self sacrifice. In gay “marriage” sex roles are redundant, sexual identity fluid and self constructed, faithfulness is optional and childlessness enables a quicker, more pain free exit.

But marriage as a traditional instituion has already been been challenged by today’s hyper-individualism and hunger for self expression through change and experimentation. Sex roles have become more ambiguous as women became breadwinners. The kids just have to fit around the priorities of their parents.

So marriage as it has now become would suit many gay people down to the ground. The shifting sands of many of their relationships simply mirror the shifting sands of many of our own.

* it’s effectively a contract in which your assets are blended with another’s, yet this ‘contract’ has no penalty for breach.

* participants can’t set the terms of the contract; even pre-nups are not guaranteed to stand up in a court of law. Plus I can imagine a range of innovations that would be totally impossible under current law

* The state will deem you to have entered a contract, regardless of whether you wanted to or not.
This ‘contract creep’ if I can coin a phrase, is the biggest one. Deeming people to be in marriages or marriage-like relationships has, on its own, multiple undesirable consequence.
- it produces much pernicious litigation;
- it provides a mechanism for deception in order to gain assets;
- it muddies the water as to who is, and who is not, in a contractual arrangement with whom.

I hope that the shape of the solutions are somewhat evident from the description of the problems.

This ‘contract creep’ if I can coin a phrase, is the biggest one. Deeming people to be in marriages or marriage-like relationships has, on its own, multiple undesirable consequence.
- it produces much pernicious litigation;
- it provides a mechanism for deception in order to gain assets;
- it muddies the water as to who is, and who is not, in a contractual arrangement with whom.

…I would like to add, DD, if you may allow me, in the words of JC…it encourages “pump and dump” (lets assume marriage is pro social and it effectively discourages marriage) and “why the fuck would a young guy want to get married now because he has been totally and utterly emasculated by the courts”…

A good analysis DD. I really think this is where abolishing the marriage act etc becomes obviously desirable.

Except dot, the common law recognizing de facto marriages is implicated in each of dd’s points.

That’s just plain wrong anyway. Common law marriages did not make pre nuptial agreements ultra vires, even if they look like they are impossible prima facie. You cannot dismiss the possibility of constructive trusts etc.

Do not even consider the argument of telling courts what constructive trusts they do and do not recognise, they have basically ignored legislation doing the same, and rightly so – such laws are unworkable.

The law recognising de facto relationships isn’t common law, it is legislation

Well, the only difference is that the latter requires that “The parties must hold themselves out to the world as husband and wife…”

But, anyway, in Australia I don’t think that is true. It appears that the common law inconsistently recognized de facto relationships and that this was systemtized by state and federal legislation from the 1980s onwards.

Huh? Are you seriously arguing that everyone married under common law…were not actually married because they didn’t have your religious preferences?

dot, can you outline again what problems you saw with the DOMA and Proposition 8 cases. I saw a series of comment of yours, maybe two weeks back, but over the course of reading what you wrote could not make heads or tails of just where you stood by the end.

I don’t think I need to. If a couple meet the conditions as set-out they would be thought of as de facto married and given this may be the subject of: pernicious litigation; deception in order to gain assets; as well as muddying the waters about who is and who isn’t in such a relationship.

It’s not often you hear the truth from people who lie about their agendas, but here’s an instance in which gay activist, Masha Gessen, admits “we lie that the institution of marriage is not going to change”

It’s not about tolerance or acceptance, nor has it ever been. “We just want to get married too…” has always been a lie and it’s unfortunate that people on our side like Bill O’Reilly find it to be such a compelling argument. But this is just a smaller piece to a greater goal of tearing down the pillars of western civilization through cultural Marxism.

UK Equalities Minister Mrs Miller confirmed to MPs and peers on the committee that friends of the same sex would be free to marry under the Bill, in order to boost their pension, property and inheritance rights, even if they had no intention of having a romantic relationship with each other.

There is currently no “legal requirement” for any marriage to be consummated and nothing stops friends of the opposite sex from marrying now, she said.
“We all know that marriages are very different for different people but there is no change that will be effected by this Bill,” the minister added.

“it’s effectively a contract in which your assets are blended with another’s, yet this ‘contract’ has no penalty for breach.”

That’s not true. Penalties include terminating the contract, alimony, and child support. Ideally people would be able to set whatever penalties they liked.

“participants can’t set the terms of the contract”

They can and do, however government interferes and sets terms of its own, like it having to be between a man and a woman. Naturally I would like to have the parties set all of their own terms – this is the essence of marriage privatisation.

“even pre-nups are not guaranteed to stand up in a court of law.”

Pre-nuptial agreements are overturned by the same principles that overturn other ‘unfair’ contracts. This happens to wills as well.

“The state will deem you to have entered a contract, regardless of whether you wanted to or not.”

Another argument for privatisation.

“I hope that the shape of the solutions are somewhat evident from the description of the problems.”

Liberty Quotes

We must comprehend that it is impossible to improve the economic conditions of the underdeveloped nations by grants in aid. If we send them foodstuffs to fight famines, we merely relieve their governments from the necessity of abandoning their disastrous agricultural policies.— Ludwig von Mises